MedPage is reporting that the give and take of marriage may be enough to stave off Alzheimer’s disease and other cognitive impairment – based upon a prospective population-based study which found that people living alone from midlife on were almost three times as likely to develop some level of cognitive impairment as those who were living with a spouse. 

My Take?

Note: This blog contains descriptions of a sexual nature that are inappropriate for children.

LifeSiteNews.com is reporting that Planned Parenthood, the world’s largest promoter of abortion and un-restricted sexual activity for young people, has gone “over the top” with a series of videos on the internet aimed at teens, says the American Life League. Titled, “Take Care Down There,” the series of explicit videos features situations Planned Parenthood evidently believes are typical of those that young people will face and for which they require sex advice. In each, the conversation (or, in one case, the oral sex) is interrupted by an unidentified middle-aged man, who instructs the kids in the Planned Parenthood philosophies.

My Take?

USA Today columnist, Kim Painter, writes today about “Vacation deprivation,” as it has been dubbed by Expedia.com. The phenomena has been spreading for years as Americans’ vacations get shorter or are skipped entirely. But this year’s high travel costs, flying hassles and spooky economy may be creating a “perfect storm” that keeps people hunkered down as never before. Believe it or not, this may negatively impact your health.

My Take?

A recent news story, Why time off is time well spent for your health, emphasized the health benefits of a frequent, restful vacations. The story reminded me of this section of my book God’s Design for the Highly Healthy Child. I hope you’ll enjoy and apply this information:

Don’t be fooled by this headline from WebMD Health News reporting a researcher who says that watermelon may be a natural Viagra. 

My Take?

CitizenLink is reporting that FRC Action President Tony Perkins is calling on Sen. Barack Obama to clarify his statements about when life begins. Perkins and his infant son are featured in a new TV commercial, which is airing in Cincinnati, Atlanta and Dallas.

My Take?

LifeNews.com is reporting the comments of a Princeton University professor who says women are not using birth control pills correctly and the misuse is resulting in pregnancies and abortions that wouldn’t otherwise occur. Professor James Trussell says about 8 percent of women who use the birth control pill become pregnant annually and get abortions because they don’t take the pills faithfully.

My Take?

According to the BBC, fertility experts in Great Britain have called for a dramatic cut in the number of twins born after IVF treatment. IVF clinics in the UK will be expected to reduce the number of multiple births from a national average of one in four to 10% over the next three years. It will mean increasing the proportion of women who have a single embryo transferred back into their womb.

My Take?

According to a report on CitizenLinke.org, the Supreme Court in California recently heard a case that pitted homosexual rights against religious freedom. At the center of the case was a lesbian who sued two doctors who declined to provide in vitro fertilization (IVF). The doctors were concerned about conducting IVF for someone who would be a single parent. Even though they referred the lesbian to another fertility doctor and offered to pay for any extra cost, the court is likely to rule against the freedom of the doctors to follow their consciences.

My Take?

Life News is carrying an interesting debate about whether pro-lifers should use the word “conception” or “fertilization” to describe the beginning of human life.

On one side of the debate is my friend, Jack Willke, M.D., the president of Life Issues Institute. Jack is long considered the father of the modern-day pro-life movement.

ABC News is reporting that “brain scans have provided the most compelling evidence yet that being gay or straight is a biologically fixed trait.”

The researchers say that the brain scans they performed revealed that in gay people, key structures of the brain governing emotion, mood, anxiety and aggressiveness resemble those in straight people of the opposite sex.

HealthDay News reports new research that found that women in happy marriages tend to sleep more soundly than women in unhappy marriages. The research does not answer the question, “Which comes first – does the unhappy marriage lead to poor sleep, or does poor sleep contribute to a bad marriage?”